KL Rahul’s stylish hundred at No 4 and a throwback to Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s days of yore were the big gains for India in their emphatic 95-run win over Bangladesh in the second World Cup warm-up game on Tuesday.
Rahul (108 off 99 balls) took the attack back to theopposition after early dismissals while Dhoni’s free-spirited approach also gothim a century (113 off 78 balls) as their 164-run stand powered India to 359for 7 against a Bangladesh attack that went off the boil.
Bangladesh batsmen barring Liton Das (73) and MushfiqurRahim (90), who added 120 runs for the third wicket, were never in charge. Theywere all-out for 264 in 49.3 overs.
If Rahul and Dhoni were the biggest positives to haveemerged from batting, Kuldeep Yadav (3/47 in 10 overs) and Yuzvendra Chahal(3/55 in 10 overs) also gained in much-needed confidence going into thetournament proper.
It was a walk in the park for India, whose pacers JaspritBumrah, Mohammed Shami and Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowled only 14 out of the 49.3overs.
For skipper Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri, the biggestsatisfaction has to be Rahul’s performance at No 4. His technique was perfectand the risk-free attacking batting as per Shastri’s lingo was “just whatthe doctor ordered”.
And what could make Rahul’s case even stronger is the factthat Vijay Shankar had a forgettable game (2 off 7 balls and 0/46 in 6 overs)in both departments.
Rahul and Dhoni had contrasting approaches in their batting,which yielded favourable results for the title contenders. Dhoni used theplatform created by Rahul to launch a brutal assault in the final overs to takethe score past 350.
While Shikhar Dhawan (1) was back in the hut after beingadjudged plumb in-front by Mustafizur Rahaman, Rohit Sharma (19 off 42 balls)struggled for the better part of his stay, even as skipper Kohli (47 off 46balls) looked solid at the other end.
Rahul looked solid from the beginning and found the gapswith ease, hitting 12 boundaries and four sixes. Dhoni’s innings had eightboundaries and as many as seven sixes.
With the composed Dhoni dealing with the singles and theoccasional boundary, Rahul was in his flowing self during his stay at thecrease. However, after the first 25 balls in which Dhoni scored 24, he suddenlychanged gears, attacking young off-spinner Mehidy Hasan Miraj and Bangladeshwere left ducking for cover.
Rahul started with a cut off Abu Jayed followed by anoff-drive. Jayed repeatedly provided him width and he beat the off-side cordonwith ease.
When Shakib bowled short, he was dispatched over themid-wicket fence for a maximum.
The rusty Shakib (2/58 in 6 overs) was taken to the task byboth Rahul and Dhoni, who got easy runs off the world’s No. 1 rankedall-rounder. Rahul hit Mustafizur (1/43 in 8 overs) for two sixes over squareleg before being dismissed by Sabbir Rahaman’s part-time spin in the 44th over.
Dhoni then took over and the last overs produced 91 runswith the veteran taking Rubel Hossain (2/62 in 8 overs) to the task in the 45thand 47th overs, scoring 25 runs. In between, the 46th over from Sabbir fetchedIndia 15 runs.His century came with a signature Dhoni six — adown the ground shot off a length delivery from Jayed.